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352nd out of 612 books
—
1,318 voters
Skin Deep (Laura Blackstone #1)
by
Mark Del Franco (Goodreads Author)
A THRILLING NEW URBAN FANTASY SERIES FROM THE AUTHOR OF UNFALLEN DEAD AND UNQUIET DREAMS.
She'll need to keep up appearances-if she wants to stay alive...
Being an undercover agent has its occupational hazards, but Laura Blackstone makes it look easy. As a spy for a fey intelligence agency, she uses her magical abilities to create disguises that are skin deepglamours that mu...more
She'll need to keep up appearances-if she wants to stay alive...
Being an undercover agent has its occupational hazards, but Laura Blackstone makes it look easy. As a spy for a fey intelligence agency, she uses her magical abilities to create disguises that are skin deepglamours that mu...more
Mass Market Paperback, 304 pages
Published
July 28th 2009
by Ace
(first published July 2009)
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First in the Laura Blackstone urban fantasy series revolving around a druidess operative in Washington D.C.
This is based on the same culture and fey/elvish courts as in Del Franco's Connor Grey series, but not the same characters, and I believe these events take place earlier than the Connor Grey series.
My Take
As political as the Connor Grey series, it has a more personal feel to it. Laura Blackstone is very D.C. political. Rather hands-offish. Her particular schtick is the three characters she...more
This is based on the same culture and fey/elvish courts as in Del Franco's Connor Grey series, but not the same characters, and I believe these events take place earlier than the Connor Grey series.
My Take
As political as the Connor Grey series, it has a more personal feel to it. Laura Blackstone is very D.C. political. Rather hands-offish. Her particular schtick is the three characters she...more
Laura Blackstone is a Druidess who is head of PR for the Fey Guild in Washington DC. She's also well to do Mariel Tate, an operative in the international intelligence agency with enough connections and respect to get high ranking DC officials to give her what she needs. And to help out the DC Swat Team, she's Janice Crawford of InterSec, a Druidess with limited powers struggling to make ends meet.
Laura has always done her best for the Guild and the various Fey agencies that interconnect, often c...more
Laura has always done her best for the Guild and the various Fey agencies that interconnect, often c...more
Living multiple separate lives is very draining for the heroine in Mark Del Fraco's new series. In this installment she is juggling three personas: Laura Blackstone public relations, Janice Crawford SWAT, and Mariel Tate InterSec operative. Being a druidess, the main character has a great memory and has little problem living her separate identities, until one case brings them all together.
I almost didn't read Skin Deep due to the negative reviews here. I should know better by now, since I like m...more
I almost didn't read Skin Deep due to the negative reviews here. I should know better by now, since I like m...more
Actual rating 2.5 stars. I picked this up because I've been enjoying the Connor series, but almost put it down. I found the main character's three identities confusing at first and overall unbelievable. Since one identity is a PR agent and another a highly placed fey security druidess, it seems implausible that the identities are long term sustainable, despite the author's attempts to show small work-arounds in identity switching. A major emotional instability is the fact that Laura continually...more
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I didn't enjoy this book as much as I enjoy the Conner Grey series. Laura Blackstone is a top-ranking guild official and powerful who frequently takes on other identities with the help of glamor. In Skin Deep Laura and her other identities Mariel and Janice all become involved in the same case.
Skin Deep is rather slow for the first half of the novel. Eventually it picks and the reader is able to become more involved. It is a little difficult keeping track of characters. Laura meets other people...more
Skin Deep is rather slow for the first half of the novel. Eventually it picks and the reader is able to become more involved. It is a little difficult keeping track of characters. Laura meets other people...more
Laura Blackstone lives in the same universe as Mark Del Franco's Connor Grey series and both are Druids. But Grey's in Boston and Blackstone's in Washington, D.C. She likes politics and does it well. She is the PR Director for the Fey Guild. And that's where it starts to get complicated, because she is also, under a glamour, Janice Crawford who works with the Washington, DC police as a Druid. And very early on in the book a mission goes south. And she's Mariel Tate, under another glamour, a hig...more
Okay, seriously, five stars just isn't enough for this book. I loved it. It had everything a person could want in a book. There was plenty of danger, mystery, intrigue, action, excitement, complexity, with a huge helping of character development thrown in. Plus, in a world where it seems original ideas have been all used up, Skin Deep is one of the most original books I've read all year.
Like the Connor Grey novels, the world of Laura Blackstone is a world where fairies have been thrust into the...more
Like the Connor Grey novels, the world of Laura Blackstone is a world where fairies have been thrust into the...more
Nov 04, 2010
Ami
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
urban-fantasy-paranormal-futuristic
3.5 stars
Laura Blackstone is the PR director for Fey Guild. She is also Janice Crawford, a druid working for SWAT Team in Washington DC and Mariel Tate, a high-ranking agent within a global security firm, InterSec. Laura keeps her other personas separate by magic. On a mission gone awry, Laura (as Janice) is nearly killed while one other member of her team is shot dead. Using her Mariel persona, Laura tries to get answer on what is wrong with the mission, which leads her into a conspiracy that m...more
Laura Blackstone is the PR director for Fey Guild. She is also Janice Crawford, a druid working for SWAT Team in Washington DC and Mariel Tate, a high-ranking agent within a global security firm, InterSec. Laura keeps her other personas separate by magic. On a mission gone awry, Laura (as Janice) is nearly killed while one other member of her team is shot dead. Using her Mariel persona, Laura tries to get answer on what is wrong with the mission, which leads her into a conspiracy that m...more
This was a great first book for a series. It totally confused me at the beginning (introducing 6 characters in the first chapter?! Are you kidding me! I could barely keep track of the main character who was actually 3 characters.) but the world building was fantastic, the characters engaging, and the plot excellent.
Laura Blackstone, Mariel Tate, and Janice Crawford are all the same person thanks to Laura's fey ability to create alternate persona's and switch between them when the need calls for...more
Laura Blackstone, Mariel Tate, and Janice Crawford are all the same person thanks to Laura's fey ability to create alternate persona's and switch between them when the need calls for...more
8 likes · like · see review
All of the different glamours, personas..whatever...had me confused for the first half of the book. There were a lot of characters attached to each persona, too, so that aided in my confusion. Thankfully, the story had promise and lived up to that once I got past the halfway point. I've heard too many good things about Del Franco from 'trusted agents' so I knew there was a diamond in all of that confusing dross. Ann Aguirre is one of those 'trusted agents' and I won the book from her blog, so I...more
For readers not familiar with the fantasy world of Mark Del Franco, the Seelie Court established the Fey Guild to represent Fairy High Queen Maeve of Tara, diplomatically, and to work as a police force to investigate local magic-related crimes committed by fey. Laura Blackstone is an undercover agent for the International Global Security Agency, or InterSec, which investigates magic-related international criminal activity. Laura, whose cover job is public relations director for the Fey Guild, ca...more
This book was great fun to read. It was like Sydney Bristow from Alias, but with all sorts of supernatural creatures.
Laura is managing 3 different personalities and trying not to get lost in any of them, all the while getting her job done. The only 2 people that know all about her are her boss and his girlfriend, who is also a great healer. This book has all the markings of a great spy thriller, good cops and bad cops, assistants you don't know if they are betraying you, and all sorts of politic...more
Laura is managing 3 different personalities and trying not to get lost in any of them, all the while getting her job done. The only 2 people that know all about her are her boss and his girlfriend, who is also a great healer. This book has all the markings of a great spy thriller, good cops and bad cops, assistants you don't know if they are betraying you, and all sorts of politic...more
I read Mr. Del Franco's books because I am a biblioaddict and the first half of his books is often so boring, I can easily put them down and get things done! They usually get much more interesting action wise near the end. However, as a gay man, I wish he would own his own experience rather than making up charactars whose connection to him is fuzzy at best. He just doesn't write about love or sex with any fire. But I do like his world-building and his discussion of magic/essence as energy and ho...more
I liked this book more than I expected to: it's well-written, and with characters who didn't drive me crazy. I'm definitely reading the next book in the Laura Blackstone series, and I might even check out the series that features a male protagonist. So far I've read urban fantasy by Laurell K. Hamilton, Jim Butcher, Anton Strout, and now Mark Del Franco: Butcher is still #1, but Del Franco has slid into the #2 spot. In fact, I might not bother reading any more Strout now (I gave up on Hamilton y...more
***3.5 stars***
I'm a huge Mark Del Franco fans. I'd be hard pressed to find anything to complain about--even anything that disappoints me--in his Connor Grey series. This book is the first of a spin off series set in the same world and comes chock full of the same rich worldbuilding that made me fall in love with the Connor Grey series. However, I had a harder time connecting with the main character in this book than I do in the other series. I suspect this is because Laura is struggling with id...more
I'm a huge Mark Del Franco fans. I'd be hard pressed to find anything to complain about--even anything that disappoints me--in his Connor Grey series. This book is the first of a spin off series set in the same world and comes chock full of the same rich worldbuilding that made me fall in love with the Connor Grey series. However, I had a harder time connecting with the main character in this book than I do in the other series. I suspect this is because Laura is struggling with id...more
This is an intriguing beginning to a series. I've played a character with similar abilities in a long-running roleplaying game, so I was particularly interested in this book. I think the author did an excellent job of exploring just how much could be done with "essence" (glamour), while setting believable limits to the character's abilities. She has an exceptionally well-trained memory, but even she slips on a few details here and there when juggling too many personas or with someone very close...more
Mar 11, 2010
Angela
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
ebooks,
urban-fantasy
After getting four books in on the Connor Grey series, it's both a refreshing and a disconcerting change of pace to jump over into the Laura Blackstones, the new series Del Franco is spinning off. This series is set in the same universe, but featuring a new protagonist, the druidess Laura Blackstone, a covert operative who operates under three, count 'em, three different identities at once for the Guild. And when an op she's on under one of her covers goes horribly, horribly wrong, Laura has to...more
This is one of the best books I’ve come across in a long time. No nonsense characters and a very complex and intelligent storyline. Absolutely loved it. So hard to find a fantasy book that has no mention of a virgin librarian or some other stupid thing of this sort! Very realistic and believable world. I can’t fault this book at all. Attention: for all those who enjoy a pink snot, repetitive love making involving virgin librarians - this book is not for you!
I was pleasantly surprised with this book. Del Franco is a new author to me, and I usually avoid male authors like the plague (not to be mean but...). The story was interesting, the mystery aspect intriguing. The light romance was nice. However, by the end I just didn't feel as if the whole story clicked into place. Early hints and suspicions were never explained (which doesn't bother me terribly, but I had thought they might have been founded on something).
I love this author, though I didn't enjoy this book as much as I have ones in the past by him. I found it a little confusing at times. All the switching back and forth of persona's that Laura was doing. And then the main plot was just very confusing at times or me. I did like the characters a lot though. I like reading books about the Fey and I love his convergence world. Hopefully the next Laura Blackstone will be a little better.
I liked his other series better.
The main character spends a lot of time switching identities, and then complaining about how empty and lonely her life is because she keeps switching identities. The plot was a bit hard to follow. I guess it's possible the series will get better once it starts using established characters rather than introduce all new ones; that's usually how these things go.
The main character spends a lot of time switching identities, and then complaining about how empty and lonely her life is because she keeps switching identities. The plot was a bit hard to follow. I guess it's possible the series will get better once it starts using established characters rather than introduce all new ones; that's usually how these things go.
Many of the political and social interactions was just a repeat of other fantasy seelie/faerie books. Perhaps if the characters had been more interesting, it would not have mattered. However, I felt Laura was given just enough to form a paper cut out and then moved around between three characters, and then her lack of personality blamed on that she has to hide between the three.
If you are a fan of Connor Grey and Mark Del Franco's stories from the "weird" of Boston you will probably enjoy this. Same magic, some people overlap and the same basic structure of politics. Unlike the Connor Grey novels this one has the point of view of Laura Blackstone/Mariel Tate/Janice Crawford - different glamours of the same person and as much as Connor is on the outside, Laura is the inside. We start by meeting Janice who is working as a Druid for the DC Swat team as they go in to take...more
Finished but forgettable, this is one of those breed of Urban Fantasy that didn't hook me with either mythology or characters. To be honest, though, the first Kate Daniels wasn't an instant slam dunk for me, and now it's a cannon favorite, so I'll keep on eye on this one to dip back into the series later.
1 like · like · see review
It's not that this is bad, but I was bored. I tried to get into this because the concept sounded fascinating and it is... or rather it would have been if the narration weren't so heavy-handed. The author's voice is so strong that Laura loses any sense of personality. Rather than focusing on the plot, too much emphasis is on the various characters in the beginning that it becomes all exposition and little action. It's possible I might be able to finish this at some later date but this drags on fa...more
I am extremely disappointed to find out that ACE has dropped this series. I like it every bit as much as I liked the Conner Grey series and they certainly haven't been putting out any volume of masterpieces that they should be willing to let this go.
The plot and conflicts were a little bit confusing at times, which stemmed from the main characters 3 separate lives, social standings, and level of ability. Around the middle of the book I started getting bored, but the addition of Sinclair livened the story up again, and I couldn't bring myself to put it down again! :)
Completely worth the wait! This was a great UF book about the fey and Druids that also had elements of undercover police work. The main character Laura Blackstone works as a PR agent for one of the fey agencies.. she also works undercover in various jobs and under various names. During this book she alternates between 3 aliases, and all of them are involved in a dangerous situation.
The plot moved really quickly, and it started off with a bang. Laura was undercover as a SWAT member and they were...more
The plot moved really quickly, and it started off with a bang. Laura was undercover as a SWAT member and they were...more
2 likes · like · see review
A wonderful addition to Del Franco's Convergent World, and a great start to a new series. Laura Blackstone is a well-developed character and a protagonist who's easy to like. I look forward to reading more about her.
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Mark Del Franco's first novel UNSHAPELY THINGS was published in 2007 by Ace Books. That title began the urban fantasy series featuring Connor Grey and continues in UNQUIET DREAMS (2008) and UNFALLEN DEAD (2009). In July 2009, a new series featuring Guild agent Laura Blackstone will begin with SKIN DEEP.
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Nov 10, 2009 12:53pm